president that the speaker's number one goal is to get elected speaker on january 3. >> reporter: january 3 is the deadline for the new congress to start work. if a fiscal cliff fix isn't passed by then, the start of a new congress will likely delay matters even more. which is why the focus now is on reaching a nano-deal. >> the minimal that they can put together to avoid the fiscal cliff which will have sadly almost no impact on the long- term debt trajectory, but right now, neither markets nor the congress care about that. >> reporter: congress has never been terrific at long-range planning, but now the definition of long range seems to be 48 hours. >> you don't hear people talking, well a year from now, we allyeed to be here. you hear, well we need to do that this week. we need to do that day after tomorrow. this short-time frame horizon is new and i think people who think we are going to have tax reform and entitlement reform next year are way, way off base. >> cutting short his vacation but it's unclear whether he has the power to force a last minute solution through a deeply divided